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Gaits of Heaven

Gaits of Heaven

Titel: Gaits of Heaven Kostenlos Bücher Online Lesen
Autoren: Susan Conant
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What do think your precious Eumie was? Well, I’ll tell you what she was! A marriage wrecker! A conniving bitch! A dirty little sneak!” With an exaggerated shrug, Ted said, “The truth comes out, Johanna. Holly, I hope you’re paying attention, because you might have to testify to what that woman is saying. She hated my Eumie. She was consumed by jealousy and envy. So she—”
    “You are such a bullshit artist, Ted! She was a dirty sneak, and you know it. She knew all your little secrets, didn’t she? But you couldn’t trust her. Is that why you killed her? To keep her loud mouth shut?”
    Caprice had pulled herself to her feet. She was resting one hand on the hood of the car, the other on Dolfo’s head. When I turned to her, I was horrified at myself. She should never have heard any of this fight. Tears were running down her face.
    “We’re leaving,” I whispered as I took Dolfo’s leash. “I’ll be back in a second.”
    In no more than twenty seconds, I was handing Dolfo’s leash to Barbara, who must have been next to her front door when I rang the bell. “Just take him. Please!” I handed her Wyeth’s keys. “Could you return these once we’ve left? I’m in a hurry. Caprice shouldn’t have to listen to what’s going on out there.”
    “Of course not,” Barbara said. “Go!”
    As I led Caprice to my car, Ted and Johanna continued to trade vicious accusations at top volume. They had returned to the dispute about which of them had ruined their son. The son, Wyeth, was, of course, right there. Although he was the subject of the fight, neither parent seemed aware of his presence. I knew that I was witnessing one of the final battles in an epic war between love and hate. The forces of love were in retreat; they were nowhere to be seen. Hate fought hate. There could be no victor.
     

CHAPTER 39
     
    On that same Tuesday afternoon, Anita Fairley marches triumphantly out of Dr. Vee Foote’s office. Anita feels vindicated and liberated. No more of that trauma and healing shit! No more relationship addiction and no more making amends! All along, she has been depressed. Depressed! She has been suffering from depression! What a beautiful revelation! Rubbing the prescription between her fingers, she can barely contain her joy. Once she reaches her car and settles into the driver’s seat, she teaches into her purse, extracts the samples that Dr. Foote s° generously gave her, and dry swallows one capsule. Then she repeats the action: a double dose.
    She’ll fix that Ted Green! She’ll hire a private investigator and sue him for malpractice! He misdiagnosed and mistreated her. She’ll get him. She’ll ruin him. She’ll grind him into the ground.
    Could the magic capsules already be at work? Now? Within seconds? She is perhaps the happiest depressed person on earth. She is delighted. She savors the prospect of revenge.
     

CHAPTER 40
     
    That same Tuesday evening, I pinned Rita in her lair, which is to say in the newly renovated apartment that occupied the third floor of my house. Our house. It’s probably a good thing that I kept my original last name instead of taking Steve’s. If marriage can make such a hash of trivial little parts of speech such as personal pronouns, just imagine the mess that matrimony could make of big, important proper nouns. I mean, those things are capitalized! Anyway, my marriage—our marriage, Steve’s and mine—had meant a radical shift in living arrangements. To compensate Rita for the inconvenience of moving to the third floor and, in fact, to lure her into staying in the house at all, we’d done a thorough and expensive revamping of the top-floor apartment: The walls and ceilings were freshly plastered and painted, the windows and sills were new, the bathroom was a veritable spa, and the kitchen was all granite and wood and weird foreign appliances with unpronounceable brand names. The range, as the brochure had persisted in calling it, was so complicated that it had taken Rita two weeks to figure out how to use the oven and the broiler; until then, she’d used nothing but the burners. Far from complaining about this miserable stove, Rita had repeatedly expressed her delight with it. It was almost impossible to use, but so what? It was foreign and magnificent, like some European gentleman whose enchanting accent and continental demeanor more than compensated for a crabby disposition and an inability to hold a job.
    Anyway, on Tuesday night after dinner,

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